


Always You

by DustyAttic



Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, Post-Mockingjay, Pre-Epilogue, everlark, growing back together, peeta's pearl
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-24
Updated: 2019-04-14
Packaged: 2019-12-07 00:26:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,523
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18227447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DustyAttic/pseuds/DustyAttic
Summary: Katniss loses the pearl Peeta gave her in the Quell a little over a year after the war has ended. She panics, bringing up questions on Peeta's half as to why the pearl means so much to her.This is my take on what happened to Peeta and Katniss that allowed them to fully grow back together. I've always wondered what it would be like for Katniss to explain her feelings, during both their Games and in 13, to Peeta, and how that would affect their relationship. I love this ship and I really hope I did them justice. I might add more one shots as I get inspired! <3





	1. Chapter 1

I wake up slowly this morning, which is different from most mornings. It is the soft glow of sunlight, and not my own screaming, that causes me to stir. Exhaling softly, I open my eyes and see the wildflowers we brought in a few days ago in the vase on the wardrobe. They’re slightly wilted by now but still pretty. I give a small smile.

“Hey,” I hear suddenly from above me. I look up to see Peeta blinking awake. 

“Hi,” I whisper back, reaching up to push his hair out of his face. From my position lying on his chest I hear his heartbeat speed up slightly as he comes fully into consciousness.

“No nightmares?” he asks, sitting up a little. 

I shake my head. “Not that I can remember.”

“Good,” Peeta says. He smiles down at me and runs his fingers through my loose hair. 

“What do you have to do today?” I ask. 

“Hmm,” Peeta hums, stretching. “Nothing much. Check on Haymitch. I’m out of raisins and walnuts.”

“Okay,” I nod, before laying my head back down again. Usually, we’re up and dressed by dawn but I can’t help but want to revel in such a peaceful morning. Peeta keeps playing with my hair, soothing me, and, after a few moments, I start to hum. 

I feel him still for an instant and then resume his steady motion. I hum an old song we learned in school, one without any real emotional connection, both for myself and for Peeta. Once it’s over, we’re quiet. 

“We should get up,” I whisper after enough time has passed that I’m beginning to feel guilty. 

Peeta nods and takes his hand out of my hair. I mourn the loss for a moment but then he’s sitting up and getting out of bed and I push it out of my mind. 

 

We go about our respective business downstairs, on the strict schedule that we follow each day. But this morning’s serenity lingers; we give each other soft smiles more often, pause in one another’s spaces rather than keeping apart. Peeta’s all but moved into my house by now but usually, once we’re out of bed, we don’t interact much besides meals. It’s easier, I’ve learned, to contain our time together. But this morning feels nice, and so I try to push away my worries and enjoy it. 

“I’m going to town soon,” Peeta tells me while I’m sitting by the fireplace, whittling some fresh arrows. “Do you need anything?”

“No,” I say. “But thank you.”

It’s been slightly over a year since the war ended. The anniversary snuck up on us. Plutarch called to ask if we would be willing to give interviews-- “All from the comfort of your homes, and without anybody there but a small camera crew and glamour team,” he assured us, as if this were some generosity on his part and not the product of my still unlifted exile from the other districts. Haymitch says Paylor will rescind this banishment once things settle down, but I’m in no rush to go anywhere. Regardless, we told Plutarch no to the interviews. He tried to push, to insist, but eventually we got Dr. Aurelius to tell him we were too unstable, that it might trigger a flashback or worse for Peeta, a relapse for me. We were forced to write statements for them to publicise, but we were otherwise left alone. When the real anniversary came, Memorial Day as they call it now, the only local commemoration was a plaque being layed outside the new Justice Building with the names of all of 12’s fallen. I stayed in bed that day. 

Now, I only go into town when absolutely necessary. Peeta does most of our shopping. 

“You’ll be okay here?” Peeta asks. He asks everytime. I don’t like to be away from him for too long, which I know he can sense, even during the times I scream at him to leave me alone. But, if I ever feel that awful fear settling into my belly when he’s gone, I have my rope, and his pearl, and that’s enough for a short while.

“Yeah,” I nod. He almost smiles at me, nodding back.

 

While Peeta is out, I debate whether or not I should head to the woods. We have enough meat to last a while but I’m getting restless after such a lazy morning. I almost regret not going with him. But, while seeing how much has been rebuilt can be nice, every new building and every new face is also a reminder of what we lost. And how it was my fault. 

But it’s not just that. Going out with Peeta, the few times we’ve done it… it draws so much attention. The newcomers, mostly, not those who’ve known us our whole lives, but still. I can feel every wide-eyed stare, every double-take. I can hear each sharp intake of breath, each slow exhale. I can’t be angry with them, really. I know who we are, what we represent. Freedom. Hope. But I still hate it. I never wanted this, I want to yell at them. We’re not your star-crossed lovers. But instead I just scowl and, as soon as we get home, go to bed. 

Peeta is better with the attention, but he struggles, too. He’s come so far in his recovery but he still lacks that grace, that calmness that the old Peeta always possessed. He is so much quieter and, when he does speak, he often fumbles with his words. I would take his hand in those moments in town, when the staring becomes just too much for him, too, but I don’t want to add fuel to the fire. And part of me worries he would pull away. 

I must have loved you a lot, I think back to him saying whenever I feel the urge to do something silly, like take his hand or lean on his shoulder outside of the cocoon of our bedroom. We don’t talk about those words, about what they did to him, about what it did to me. But they’re there. 

I decide, instead of going to the woods, to try my hand at working on the garden Peeta’s been building. I don’t want to damage it, but at the very least I can water the plants. 

I set the now-complete shafts for my arrows aside and rise, grab the watering can from its place in the kitchen. Then I head outside. 

The primrose bushes have taken to this land the best, but now there are also tomatoes, some herbs, a patch of strawberry plants, and some pretty orange flowers that are just too bright to be Peeta’s favorite color. I set to watering each area thoroughly and, by the time I’m on the rosemary, I hear Haymitch’s door open from across the way. 

“Killing his plants now too, I see,” he shouts at me. I roll my eyes and turn.

“What are you doing? It’s almost ten in the morning, shouldn’t you be passed out on you kitchen table already?”

“Train’s a day late with the liquor, so I decided I would check on my geese,” Haymitch explains. He walks down his front stoop, a little unsteady but overall in much better condition than I’ve seen him in anytime recently. So I shrug and go back to my watering. 

I hear him approaching after a few minutes but don’t turn until he’s directly beside me. “What’s that?” he asks. 

“Mint,” I tell him. “Haven’t you ever had peppermint tea?”

“Not in a lifetime, sweetheart. How’d he get all this to grow so well?”

I shrug again. “You know how he is.”

“That I do.” Haymitch looks over each plant. “Did I tell you Effie called?”

“No,” I tell him, turning all the way now. “What did she want? How is she?”

“She’s Effie. Lots of big things happening in the Capitol, apparently,” Haymitch says. 

“You mean big, big, big things,” I reply softly, taking on the affected accent that Gale and I used to mock so often. Haymitch laughs through his nose.

“Exactly. Anyway, she asked about the two of you.”

“What did you say?”

“I told her you’re as much of a recluse as ever and the boy’s gone mute.”

“That’s not fair,” I shake my head. “You know we’re doing better.” I don’t know why I’m worried about what Effie Trinket hears on my and Peeta’s recovery, but I am. I guess she’s somehow made her way onto list of people I care about. My 16-year-old self would balk at how long it’s become. 

“Yeah, yeah, I told her that, too. She was happy to hear it.” Haymitch rubs the back of his neck. “So where is he, anyway?”

“Town,” I say. I’m done watering, so I dump the rest of the can on the grass. “He needed some supplies.”

Haymitch grunts. Then he turns to head back home. “I might stop by around dinnertime,” he calls as he reaches his side of the road. 

“If you make it that long,” I call back, and smile when he waves me off. 

 

I put the watering can back and pace around the kitchen. It’s almost lunch time and Peeta hasn’t come home. We always eat together, and today should be no different. Raisins and walnuts were all he said he needed. What could be taking this long? The walk is twenty minutes at most. Maybe his prosthetic leg started acting up…

I go to take his pearl from my pocket, where I usually keep it, but find nothing. Immediately, I feel my heart drop. 

“No,” I whisper, reaching into my other pocket and feeling around there, too. I pull them both inside out but find only lint. Panic starts to swell in my chest and push one hand into my hair. “No, no.”

I rush upstairs to look in my pajama bottoms. Not there. I tear the blankets off the carefully made bed and shake them out, search the mattress, check even the pillows. Not there, either. 

Sitting down, back against the bed frame, I try to stay calm. But I can feel the tears threatening to spill over and my heart is pounding and I cannot, will not lose this last piece of him. 

You have all of him now, I try to remind myself. He’s with you, he’s okay. But that pearl, that pearl… I need it. It is the only part of him that never left me, the only thing I can hold onto to reassure myself that he will always come back. I should’ve known this would happen-- good days never come without a price. I try to take deep breaths and think of where else it could be but the panic is beginning to tear me to shreds because I have lost everything and I can’t-- I can’t--

“Katniss?”

He’s home. My heart slows slightly at the sound of his voice. I am still crying and shaking, but I drag myself up. 

“Peeta,” I croak back as I walk down the stairs, leaning my full weight on the railing. 

“Hey,” he says, coming towards me, frowning. “Are you-- what’s wrong? What’s happened?”

He takes me into his arms as soon as I get to the ground floor, tucking my head under his chin and rocking me slightly. I can’t speak, so I just cling to his shirt. 

“I’m sorry I was late,” he says softly. “We just… we had such a good morning, I didn’t think… I’m sorry."

I shake my head and keep holding onto him, vice-like. After a few minutes, he lowers us to the ground and resituates me so that I’m almost cradled in his arms. “What happened?” he whispers again, brushing my hair out of my face. 

I lean my head against his collarbone and choke out the words, “I lost it.”

“Lost what?” Peeta asks, still rocking us gently back and forth. 

“Your pearl,” I say, voice going so quiet and breathless I wonder if he’ll even hear me. 

Peeta stills. “My what?”

“The pearl you gave me,” I say, pulling back and looking up at him. I know I am red faced and snotty and puffy in the eyes but I don’t care. “On the beach, during the Quell.”

“You… kept that?” he asks, furrowing his brow. “All this time?”

I nod miserably. 

“Why would you do that?” he asks, and I can tell he’s trying to sort out some Capitol-altered memory in his head. “I saw that tape… me giving it to you. You just put it in your pocket. You barely seemed to care.”

I shake my head. “You know I’m not… good with words. But I… I kept it. All through the Quell, in 13, in battle. I kept it with me and now it’s gone and I can’t, I can’t--” I start hyperventilating again and he shhs me and gathers me back up. 

“Why would you do that?” he asks again, once I’ve calmed down enough.

“Because I loved it,” I whisper. “It was like… a piece of you. And when… when I was in 13, it was the only piece of you I had left. It kept me sane, most of the time.”

“But why do you need it now? I’m here, now. They didn’t get me.”

“But they did, Peeta. They took everyone, even you.”

Peeta leans me away from him and searches my face. He wipes under my eye and I sniffle. Then he kisses my forehead and I sigh, try to imprint the feeling into my memory. “Let’s find it,” he whispers. 

We start in the kitchen, check everywhere. The floor, the counters, even inside the cabinets and drawers. Then we move on to the living room, and even the dining room we never use. Peeta checks the bedroom again while I do the bathroom. By the time we’ve started opening doors I haven’t opened since coming back to 12, my nerves are fried. I sit down on the couch, draw my knees to my chest, and shake my head. I thought I didn’t have any more tears in me for a such a silly thing, but when Peeta sits beside me and puts his arm around my shoulders, I feel my eyes well up. 

“I’m sorry,” he whispers for the millionth time that day. “I--”

But he’s cut off my someone knocking at the door. He hesitates for a moment but then kisses my temple and stands. 

“Haymitch, it’s not a good time,” I hear him sigh. 

“I told the girl I’d come over, didn’t she pass the message along?”

“No, she… it hasn’t been the best day.”

I hear my mentor huff. “Well, she seemed to be in a pretty good mood earlier, out and about watering your plants.”

Peeta replies but I suddenly can’t hear him. Watering the plants, Haymitch said. In the garden. 

I stand and walk to the door. “Katniss?” Peeta says, worried, as I approach, just as Haymitch says, “Damn girl, what happened to you?” I push past them, almost running now.

“Katniss, wait!” Peeta shouts. I know he thinks I am running away again but I stop and fall to my knees at the garden, almost shaking. It is still light out, but not for long, so I move with haste, searching the dark soil, the grass on which I’d been standing, running my hands over the ground, desperate. I feel Haymitch and Peeta come up behind me, and Peeta starts to squat just as the tip of my pinky runs over something cool and round underneath one of the strawberry plants. 

“Oh,” I gasp, lifting the small leaf with my other hand. My pearl is there, glimmering in the sunset. I grab it, press it to my lips despite of the dirt, shaking even harder now, and fall back into a sitting position. 

“You found it?” Peeta asks, and I nod. He nuzzles my head with his nose and hugs me from the side. 

“Can someone please explain what’s going on here?” Haymitch says from behind us. I blush, embarrassed now of my dramatics. But the relief I feel, to be holding it again, outweighs the awkwardness. 

As I so often used to, I shake my head, signalling for Peeta to talk for me. “She lost the pearl I gave her in the Quell,” he says softly, as if he still can’t quite believe I could care so much about something from him.

Haymitch chuckles. “Didn’t know you were the type to get so upset about jewels, sweetheart.” 

I glare at him and stand, Peeta’s arm still around me. “It’s not some random jewel,” I spit. “I… when he was…” That’s all I can get out, but Haymitch seems to understand. He nods once.

“So, are we gonna eat, or should I just go home?”

Peeta shrugs sheepishly. “The house is a mess and we haven’t started dinner, but if you wanted to help clean up and cook, I’m sure we could whip something up.”

“Sure,” Haymitch says, shrugging. “As long as I get food I’ll do whatever house chores you need me to.”

 

We go inside. Peeta starts on dinner while Haymitch and I set to putting the house back together. 

“All this over a pearl,” I hear him mumble as we’re putting the toiletries back in their places in the bathroom, but there’s no malice behind it, and I choose to let it go. 

Peeta makes a squirrel soup and dandelion salad. I smile as I sit and see the bright yellow blooms on our plates. He doesn’t know the connection I’ve drawn between him and this particular plant, but I hold his hand under the table that night. 

 

By the time Haymitch has gone home, I’m exhausted. Many days are waking nightmares for me, but they’re not usually coupled with so much physical exertion, as well. And, most times when I’m sent spiralling back into myself, into that deep and suffocating darkness, it’s through the means of reliving old horrors, not almost experiencing new ones. I wonder, briefly, if calling the loss of the pearl a horror is silly. I have Peeta now. He came back to me. But then I remind myself of what Dr. Aurelius has been trying to drill into me for over a year now; we all heal at our own pace. Maybe, one day in the future, I’ll be ready to let go of the pearl. Or perhaps that day will never come. All that matters as I lay down in bed is that I have it with me now. 

Peeta gets in bed beside me, immediately pulling me onto his chest. I am exhausted, but I can also tell that something’s on his mind, so I look up at him. 

“Hey,” I whisper.

“Hey,” he says back, frowning. “I… I know I already asked this, but… why did you keep it? At first, I mean. Before they… had me. Why did you keep it in the Quell?”

It’s my turn to frown. “You gave it to me,” I say.

“So you just… were being polite, then?”

“No!” I say, almost angrily. Peeta flinches and I immediately berate myself. I try to be gentler, softer as I say again, “No. That wasn’t it. I… you gave it to me. And I… I care about you.” I cringe. Care is far too small of a word for what I feel for him, have felt for him since our first games. Maybe I didn’t know it then but I have realized it by now, and have thought, so many times, of telling him. But “I must have loved you a lot,” always stops me. Past tense. And he hasn’t said anything on the subject since. 

But now, as he shakes his head down at me, so clearly confused and in pain after my antics today, I feel like I owe him a full explanation. A real explanation. 

So I sit up. I’m across from him, now, and I look down at my hands. “Peeta, I… I know… I don’t what you must think of how I treated you in the Games at this point. Both Games. I know that, after the first, you were… hurt. And I… I was confused. I wasn’t able to… let what had happened… be real. Because of my family and because… it was what they wanted. That’s what I thought, anyway. That… to be with you would be to let them win. And then, during the Quell, I let myself feel a little more because… I didn’t think I’d be going home, that time.”

Peeta stares at me. I can feel his sad gaze, and it’s all I can do to keep looking down. 

“But it was never fake,” I whisper. “It was never… for them. I wanted to go home, yes. And I knew that playing into the romance would help us. But it was never fake. I… cared for you. So much. In the first Games, being with you kept me alive. I felt safe. And… cared for. And I felt like… I felt like I needed to be with you. For me, not for them. And by the Quell, I… when you hit that forcefield-- and on the beach, I… it was all real. I promise. So when you gave me the pearl, I… I kept it because you gave it to me, and it symbolised everything I felt for you.”

“What about in 13?” Peeta whispers. “You didn’t…”

“I know,” I shake my head. “I know. And I’m so sorry, Peeta. That day, when I saw Finnick and Annie run to each other, all I wanted in the world was to have that same reunion with you. But after… after I… I just couldn’t. They wouldn’t let me see you, for a while, but then I went away. Because I thought you were gone. I thought I had lost you too.” I’m ugly crying again, so I wipe my eyes. “I’m so sorry, Peeta, I’m so sorry. If I could go back, if I could just go back and change it--” 

“Shhh,” Peeta says, reaching for me. I see that his pupils are dilated slightly and worry about setting him off, pushing him back into the very dark place I’m apologizing for leaving him in. But if he is struggling, he doesn’t show it. He just pulls me into him and wraps his arms around me for the millionth time that day, kissing the side of my head. 

“What about… him?” he whispers after a while.

I sniffle again and shake my head. “I loved Gale,” I say, and he stiffens. But he has to hear it. “I loved him so much… but I was never in love with him. It was platonic. Familial. But it was so strong that when he said he… felt more, I was… confused.”

“Did you ever… was it ever more than a kiss?”

“No,” I spit. “Not physically or emotionally.”

He nods. “Not like… with us… on the beach? Or in the cave?”

“Exactly,” I nod. I can almost feel him trying to sort out his memories. So I turn and look him in the eye. “It’s always been you, Peeta.”

He sets his jaw. “You love me,” he says. “Real or not real?”

I’m startled but I try not to let it show. For so, so long I have been pushing the idea of love, or love for him, into the deepest part of me. But I surprise myself by nodding once and saying firmly, “Real.”

His face softens and he sighs, like it’s something he’s waited to hear his whole life. But then, as if to check, he says, “You’re in love with me? Not like…”

“Yes,” I rush to assure him.

He smiles again before asking, “Why did you… wait so long? To tell me all this?” 

I blush and look away again. “I didn’t know if you cared.”

“How could you ever think I wouldn’t care?”

“Well,” I shrug. My voice catches and I almost can’t believe I still have it in me to cry today. “The last time we talked about… love, you said you must have loved me a lot. Before. And I didn’t know if you ever… started again.”

“Oh, Katniss,” Peeta says softly. He shakes his head. “I… I’m so sorry.”

“It’s not your fault,” I whisper. “I’m the one who’s sorry.”

We sit in silence for a moment. Then he reaches for my hand. I give it to him, looking up through bleary eyes as he kisses it. “Can we be together now?” he asks, so quietly I almost miss it. “Can we finally love each other right?”

I let out a shaky exhale and nod. “Yes,” I say. “Yes, please.”

He nods, too, and then I am leaning forward and kissing him and he is caressing the side of my face like he did all those lifetimes ago and I’m melting into it, into him. I almost can’t believe I’ve denied myself this for so long. It feels like everything I’ve ever needed. Like coming home. And even those thoughts that usually scream at me when I’m happy, scream at me that I don’t deserve it, are quiet for the moment. He flattens his hand against my back and we lay down side by side, still kissing. After a while, however, he pulls away and takes a long breath. 

I’m still teary and shaky, but I smile now, run my thumb over his cheekbone. “I’m so tired, Peeta,” I whisper. 

“Me, too,” he says back. “But a happy tired, now.”

I nod. “Can we just stay here tomorrow?”

“Yes,” he says. He gives a ghost of his old, goofy grin. “We have a lot of lost time to make up for.”

I smile wider now and almost laugh. But I’m struggling to keep my eyes open, so I snuggle into him, pressing my face to his collarbone. I can already feel myself drifting off as he kissed my forehead and adjusts himself. “I love you,” I whisper, almost scared by how suddenly confidant I am.

He pulls me closer. “I love you too.”

And we sleep.


	2. 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Katniss comes to an important decision, and asks Peeta a question he's been waiting for.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I guess I just can't leave them haha! Thank you all so much for the amazing response to the first part of this story, and I hope you like this just as much!

The dress must be made of nettles. 

It’s beautiful, of course; everything Cinna makes is. But wearing it feels only like pain and suffering. It's tearing my skin to shreds. As I dance with Peeta, twirl across the grand floor that is far too vaste and far too empty, I wonder if I’ll stain the white fabric red. 

“Where is everyone?” I ask, not looking up at the man who was supposed to kill me and is now supposed to be my husband. 

“Over there,” he says, and I look towards the edge of the dance floor where an audience of thousands screams for us. They’re stomping, clapping, throwing roses. As devoted as ever. They’d kill themselves in the name of our love. 

“No,” I say, “where are our families?”

“Down there,” Peeta says, and I look at him. He’s staring at our feet, under our feet. The dance floor is made of ash. A femur sticks up here, a vertebrae there. I gasp and shudder and try to pull away. 

“Don’t,” Peeta says, and he holds me so tightly I almost can’t breathe. “Everyone’s watching.”

“Please,” I whisper, “take me away from here.”

“I can’t, Katniss,” he whispers back. 

I stare up at him. He’s looking beyond me, at the audience, at the ashes. His suit is white, constrictive; his hair is mussed; the bags under his eyes are too dark. “What have they done to you?”

And all at once the screaming of the crowd stops, the music stops, the dancing stops. “Nothing,” he tells me, smiling, dead in the eyes. “This is our wedding day. Isn’t it perfect?”

I can do nothing but shake my head. But then the audience is flooding the floor, coming towards us like thunder, pulling us apart, drowning Peeta in a sea of people so that I can no longer see him. “Peeta!” I shout, twisting, trembling as millions of hands touch me, stroke my hair, grab fistfuls of my dress. They’re trying to devour me. “Peeta!”

“Katniss!” I hear him call back, and he’s somewhere to my right. I struggle towards the voice. “Katniss, I’m here!”

“Peeta!” I scream as I pull through the last throng of people, of hands, and then he’s there. Just him. In front of our fireplace, eyes searching for me. I run to him, bury myself in his chest. He’s wearing his apron now, his work clothes. I’m in my hunter’s gear. 

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, trembling. 

I nod once and look back at the ground. They’re in a frenzy looking for us. Soon they’ll start trampling each other to death. “Why are they here?”

“For us,” he says, “for the wedding.”

“But we’re not married,” I say.

He smiles sadly and lets go of me. “I know.”

I open my mouth to reply but suddenly I am struck with something. I look down and it is my own arrow, plunged into my belly. I try again to speak but instead gag up blood, and when I look up Peeta is gone.

 

I wake up shaking. The room is pitch black as I scramble to push away the sweaty sheets that feel too much like my dream dress. Peeta stirs beside me. 

“Hey,” he murmurs, “nightmare?”

I nod silently, now sitting on the edge of the bed and clutching the mattress. Peeta feels around for me and, when his hand can’t find me, opens his eyes. 

“What happened?” he asks, worried. I almost never turn away from him in the wake of a bad nightmare. 

“Nothing,” I whisper. I can almost hear him frown. I know I should tell him, shouldn’t damage the trust we’ve built these last three years. But the nightmare was twisted and disturbing in a way that I haven’t experienced in a while. It wasn’t dead faces and dead bodies and bombs and fire and arenas and pain. It was him. It was us. Our wedding. 

“Okay,” Peeta sighs after a moment. “Are you gonna go back to sleep?”

Dr. Aurelius is very strict about our sleep schedules. I don’t want to ruin mine, so, without a response, I lay back down and squeeze shut my eyes. 

 

When I wake up again, it is morning and Peeta is sitting up beside me. I smile at him, watch as he sketches something I can’t yet see, oblivious to my consciousness. 

“Hi,” I whisper, stretching slightly. He looks down in surprise, and then smiles back. 

“Hi.”

He puts his sketchbook aside and lays down beside me, pushing my hair back with one steady hand. Then he kisses me, long and gentle. He lays one hand on my waist and I curl closer to him. It will be fall soon-- there have already been a few days where the air feels crisper, the breeze a bit more sharp-- but today it is warm. I let my eyes fall shut again and ask, “What were you drawing?”

“The new man from five,” he tells me. “The one who moved in last month.”

I hum my acknowledgement. He rubs up and down my back for a while and then says, “I should get up. I have an order to fill.”

“What order?”

“A cake for Thom and Ainsley. They’re having a celebration for their engagement.”

I grow stiff in his arms. “They’re getting married?”

“Yeah,” Peeta says, pulling back and looking down at me. “Don’t you remember? I told you last week.”

“Sorry,” I whisper, because I don’t remember, because I’m a bad listener, because I’m mean and selfish where he is kind and brave. But mostly because I am reminded of my dream, my nightmare, of our wedding. Because, after all this time, I am still terrified of the very idea. 

“It’s alright,” Peeta says. And then he kisses my forehead and stands to get dressed. 

 

I love him. I know that. And it’s not for anyone else but us, now. I know that too. So why am I so scared?

He started working on the cake as soon as he went downstairs, and so I slipped out to the woods quietly, before he could ask too many questions. Now I’m in a far-out grove, one I found after the war, a place that was never tainted by my time with Gale, or stained with memories of my father. A place I can be truly on my own. 

I wish there were someone I could ask. I could call my mother, but I’m sure she would be of little help. Haymitch, one of the few people who is both trustworthy to me and available, has never been my first choice when it comes to relationship issues. I think of calling someone else, Annie or Johanna, but quickly dismiss the thought. The one person who really could help me has been dead for four years now, buried under the very ashes I danced on in my dream. At the thought of her, I clench shut my eyes and shake my head. 

Maybe that’s why I’m so scared, I think when I can breathe again. Because marriage would mean giving yourself completely to someone else, someone who could be taken away at a moment’s notice. Because it’s been four years and you still can’t say her name. Because both of you are broken beyond repair, ghosts of who you used to be, and a wedding between ghosts seems silly. 

Suddenly a branch snaps to my left and I am on my knees, arrow nocked before I can think. A turkey looks at me curiously, blinking a few times, and I don’t hesitate to let the arrow fly. 

 

When I get home, Peeta is out, most likely delivering the cake. I get to work on skinning the massive bird, back aching from carrying it all the way home. 

Would it be such a terrible thing, though? I wonder. To be married to Peeta? To promise to love him forever? I already have, in so many ways. How could making it official change things, really?

The turkey’s blood stains my hands and fingernails. I sigh and slice the breast off, pop the thigh joint. This will last us a long time. 

When the meat is all clean, I wash and store away the feathers for whenever our bedding next needs to be restuffed. Then I take my pearl from its place in my pocket and roll it between my fingers, wondering when Peeta will be home.

Without much else to do, I walk to the living room and sit on the big, plush couch that faces the fireplace. I think of Peeta last night in my dream, standing by the fireplace, waiting for me like he has always been waiting for me. Then I grab our book, which sits in the drawer of the small living room table, and open it. The first page is my father. I run my fingers over Peeta’s drawing, done with so much love and care for a man he barely knew. I flip to Rue’s page, smile through my budding tears at her small face. Next is Cinna, then Clove. I find Castor’s page, and Finnick’s. Then I take a deep, trembling breath, and turn to hers.

My sister’s sweet smile beams out at me, hair done in two braids, eyes gleaming. I know Peeta took special care with this one, rendered every detail so painstakingly that it physically hurts for me to look at. Giving a wet laugh, I touch my hand to the ribbon we pinned to her page, the pressed primrose we added later. I smile through the tears that are now running in a constant stream down my face. “I wish you were here, Little Duck,” I whisper. “I have so much I need to ask you. You would know just what to say.”

I wrote so much on the page opposite to her sketch that it is basically just a mass of black. I needed every last detail of her life to be recorded, permanent. Not one second of it is missing, and yet it is still too short. 

The door opens. I start slightly and look up, wiping at my nose. Peeta walks in smiling, but his smile quickly falls when he sees me. 

“Hey, what’s wrong?” he asks, walking over and kneeling in front of me. 

“Nothing,” I shake my head. I hand him the book. “Just needed to see her.”

He nods and takes it from me, frowning down at her beautiful face. Then he looks back up at me. “You’re sure you’re okay?” he asks, reaching out one hand to cup my face. He looks at me with so much tenderness, so much love, and I realize, all at once, that I do have someone to talk to. 

“Yes,” I say, putting my hand over his. “I… I want to talk about my nightmare.”

Peeta furrows his brow, but nods and stands. He places the book back in its usual spot and sits beside me. 

“You remember… when I woke up, I didn’t want to… I was different than usual?” I ask cautiously. Peeta nods, taking one of my hands. 

“Well, I dreamed… I dreamed about our wedding.”

He is still for a moment, and then his face hardens almost imperceptibly. “In your nightmare, we got married?”

I nod. “That’s why I felt so bad. I hate that… I hate that, after all this time… I’m still so scared.”

He sighs. “It’s okay, Katniss. It’s not your fault.” But I can see the frustration in his face. He’s tired of second guessing himself, second guessing us, and he has been for a long time. He’d never say it, but I know. 

“It wasn’t just our wedding,” I try to explain. “It was… it was the one we were meant to have. Before the Quell. I… I was in the dress Cinna made and there were-- there were so many people, Peeta. We were dancing, but it wasn’t a dance floor, it was a graveyard. It was… it was like Twelve, when I first came back. And you… you weren’t you. They had changed you, somehow. Turned you into a robot. I tried to run, but the people came to us and pulled us apart and--” I shake my head, ashamed to look at him, until I realize his grip on my hand has become too tight.

“Peeta?” I ask, looking up. His eyes are wide and blackened by his pupils, and his other hand is clutching the arm of the couch like it’s the only thing keeping him sane. 

“I asked you to marry me. Real or not real?” he asks.

“Real,” I say, and I place my free hand on his shoulder, rub my thumb in what I hope are soothing circles. “I suggested it, but you asked. On TV, with Caesar.”

“But you… none of it was… real.”

“Yes,” I whisper. “It was for Snow.”

“You suggested it so we could survive. You never wanted to marry me,” he says. I open my mouth but I can’t find the words to reply. “Real or not real?!” he urges, looking around wildly. 

“Real!” I say at once, lifting my hand from his shoulder to his cheek, turning him to face me. “Can you see me, Peeta?”

“No,” he says, screwing shut his eyes. “No, where are you?”

“I’m here,” I tell him, leaning our foreheads together. “Right here. Katniss, the real Katniss.”

I wait until his breathing has calmed ever so slightly before continuing. “It’s real that I only suggested we get married so that Snow wouldn’t come after us, and it’s real that, at the time, I didn’t want to marry you. But it wasn't you, Peeta. I didn’t want to marry anyone.”

“But you-- you-- you said you loved me, you said--” he struggles, and I hold him more tightly.

“I do love you. That’s real.”

A long time passes until he’s okay again. He goes limp against me, damp with sweat, and mumbles an apology. I know how much he hates these episodes. I remember the day he came out of a particularly bad one, looked around at the damage he’d caused, looked right at me and said, with so much anger, “I’m tired of being crazy, Katniss,” before walking out of the room. Now, he just pulls out of my embrace and leans back against the couch, staring up at the ceiling. 

I watch him for a moment, before turning to face the fireplace. I think again of the end of my dream. Of Peeta, my Peeta, not their robot, waiting for me in front of the flames. Telling me so sadly, “I know,” when I said we weren’t married. And then my own arrow plunging into my stomach, cutting off any response I might’ve had. I brush my hands over the place the arrow hit and suddenly a thought rings through my head so clearly it startles me: It’s you.

And it is me. We’ve escaped the Capitol and their games, somehow, and we managed to find each other again. The reason, the only reason we’re not married now is me.

Peeta sighs and runs one hand over his face. “I’m sorry,” he says again, closing his eyes. He’s still sweating, still too pale. He’s still broken, like me. And maybe we’ll always be broken. But that’s okay, isn’t it? We’re here, we’re getting better, we love each other. If a little bit of brokenness is part of the deal, who am I to complain?

I don’t think as the next words come out of my mouth, and am almost as surprised as Peeta to hear them. “Marry me.”

Peeta’s eyes snap open. He turns to me with his eyebrows drawn in, a frown on his face. Then he sits up and shakes his head. “You asked me to marry you. Real or not real?”

“Real,” I confirm. 

He’s still struggling with it, so I take one of his hands. “Peeta Mellark,” I start again, “I’m asking you, please, to… to marry me.”

Peeta stares into my eyes. His wide blue ones are glimmering, like he still can’t believe it. Tears well up and one runs over, staining his pale cheek. I smile and wipe it away with my thumb. He continues to search my face, and it almost breaks my heart, how hard it is for him to accept that this is real. But I keep smiling, wait for his answer. 

I guess I always expected him to be the type to get overly excited about a wedding proposal. And maybe he was, once. But now he only nods, after a long, long time has passed. He nods and leans into me, pulling me close to him, resting his head on my shoulder. “Okay,” he whispers in my ear. I nod, too, and tangle my hand in his hair. “Okay,” he repeats. “Let’s get married.”

 

We plan it over dinner, over fresh turkey breast and potatoes. “Who should we invite?”

“Haymitch,” I say, and I can’t think of anyone else. There are other people I love, of course, but they are spread far and wide across Panem and I want to do this quickly. I want to be Peeta’s wife as soon as possible. 

“And should we do it at the Justice Building, or here?”

“We can do the legal part there, but the rest…”

Peeta smiles at me. “We’re really getting married, huh?” he asks, tilting his head to the side. 

I smile back. “Yeah, we’re really getting married.”

“Does that mean…” Peeta starts, blushing slightly, “does that mean you’ll be Katniss Mellark, now?”

I’m quiet for a moment. “You don’t have to be,” he rushes to assure me. “I just--”

“Yes,” I cut him off, suddenly confidant. “I would like that.”

He beams at me. “Alright.”

 

We clear our plates slowly. I wash, and he dries, like every night. Then we stand by the sink, Peeta behind me, staring across the street at Haymitch’s house, where a single light is lit. “We should tell him,” I whisper, and Peeta nods. 

“Tomorrow,” he says back. “Tonight, let’s just stay here.”

I nod once. He kisses the side of my neck, my jaw, the soft spot behind my ear, and I shudder. We’re not often intimate, but tonight I feel that warmth in the pit of my stomach, and its already spreading like wildfire as he nips at my earlobe. 

“I love you,” he whispers.

“I love you, too,” I say back, turning to cup his face in my hands and keep kissing him. 

“We’re getting married,” he murmurs, lifting me so that my legs wrap around his waist. “We’re going to be married.”

I nod, humming into his mouth. A smile creeps onto my face as I think about it, threatens to overtake me. “We’re getting married,” I repeat. “We’re getting married.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments encourage me lots<33

**Author's Note:**

> Comments encourage me lots!<3


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